Project Title: Enhancing Digital Freedoms through Monitoring, Reporting and Advocacy
Donor Organization: Black Sea Trust for Regional Cooperation (BST)
Project Contract Number: BST-21.089.GE25.1
Total Budget: $ 29,700 ($ 24,920 requested from BST)
Duration of the Project: May 1, 2021-January 1, 2022

Project Summary

The project aims to strengthen digital freedoms in Georgia through monitoring and reporting the activities and performance of Internet/communications sector state regulator in terms of accountability and proportionality of its decisions with regard to digital freedoms. To this end, analytical blog-posts and a comprehensive report will be prepared based on the monitoring results. To consider the opinions of all relevant stakeholders, workshops/focus group meetings will be conducted. Monitoring results and elaborated policy recommendations will be communicated during the final presentation.

Goal/Objectives

The general goal of the project is to ensure and strengthen safeguards and Internet freedoms in Georgia through monitoring, reporting and advocacy.

To this end, the major objectives of the project are:

• Increase accountability of the public institutions regulating the communications/Internet sphere in the country;

• Foster multi-stakeholder dialogue on the issue of performance of the mentioned regulator and identify common concerns;

• Identify major challenges and controversial decisions of the regulator in the sphere of Internet regulation/digital freedoms;

• Mitigate the elaborated challenges by reporting and devising potential solutions;

• Propose policy recommendations and communicate them with all relevant stakeholders for positive

Activities

1) Preparatory stage: elaborating a comprehensive methodology and submitting FOI requests

2) Holding workshops/focus group interviews

3) Monitoring and reporting

4) Preparing a monitoring report

5) Elaborating policy recommendations

6) Final presentation

7) Cooperation with media

Planned Activities and Project Budget

Contract